


ready to let go

by dirtyvalentines



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Rewrite, Fighting, Fix-It, Fluff and Angst, Gay Mike Wheeler, Gay Will Byers, Hurt/Comfort, Internalized Homophobia, Love Confessions, M/M, Mike Wheeler Loves Will Byers, Mutual Pining, Will Byers Loves Mike Wheeler, they deserved their closure and a happy ending thats it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-25
Updated: 2019-09-25
Packaged: 2020-10-27 03:20:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20753483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dirtyvalentines/pseuds/dirtyvalentines
Summary: sometimes, it hurt to keep all the secrets that will byers did. which is why on that fateful summer night in the wheeler garage, it hurt too much—so he let one go.





	ready to let go

_July 2nd, 1985_

Heavy silence. Amidst the white noise of the pouring rain inside the Wheeler garage, a heavy, dangerous silence loomed in the air surrounding the two of them.

On any normal day, Will could find comfort and peacefulness in the levity of quietude. And if ever it became too quiet, with the unsettling feeling of _weight_, so his thoughts and anxieties were granted enough room to fill it; he would simply turn his music up to the highest setting. It had become easy to drown it out. By memorizing the guitar riffs, the bass, the drums, the lyrics that really resonated with him. But right now, as he stood frozen in the garage, he was the one drowning. In a way he understood all too well, everything was rising too high, it was too much. He forgot how to breathe. Will had felt this before.

He just never thought that it would be his best friend who would make him feel it all over again.

_It’s not my fault you don’t like girls. _ _It’s not my fault you don’t like girls. _ _It’s not my fault you don’t like girls._

Hot tears pricked in the corners of Will’s green-brown eyes. All of crippling anxiety, of sadness, of defeat. His heavy shortness of breath heaved almost painfully in his ribcage as Mike Wheeler’s poor choice of words replayed over and over in his head, each time somehow more daunting than the one before. 

Will soon realized that he didn’t think El was stupid. Honestly, he barely say he knew her beyond a proper introduction (and the fact that she had saved his ass a handful of times.) He knew he upheld an unsaid respect for her. What he _didn’t_ know was if Mike had meant for his words to come out the way he had heard them.

No, he couldn’t have. Not even his own mother knew of that part of him. His dad had always suspected, though. That was why he hated him so much. Will wouldn’t have gone as far as to say he had been _happy_ to drive him away, just like he did everyone else. In a way, Mike was right. It wasn’t his fault, but it wasn’t Will’s, either. He would do anything to change it, to be accepted, seen as normal, in the direction society wants to push him, but he couldn’t.

If he could be a different person, he would. Anger simmered and boiled venomously inside him. How dare he. How dare he imply that he actually had a choice.

Words really did leave more lasting bruises than fists ever could.

Mike must have seen Will’s guard go down, must have caught the fleeting flash of betrayal within Will’s widening eyes. Maybe heard the gust of air that was stolen from his lungs as his walls collapsed, the sound of his heart breaking just a little bit more. Because his eyelids closed in petulance, as if he actually had the fucking right to be irritated with him. Will could plainly see the regret casting a shadow over Mike’s face as he struggled to find the right words to fix it, to take it all back. The thought crept into Will’s mind briefly that maybe that counted for _something_, but he shook it off. It didn’t matter. He had said what he said, and there was no taking it back. Shit just didn’t work like that.

“Look, I— I’m not trying to be a jerk. Okay?”

Now, to be fair about it, Will losing his temper occurred about as frequent as the sun and moon aligning. He took after his mom in that way, with a volatile ire, except she tended to lose it more often (not that he could blame her). It always managed to startle everyone, magnetized their attention, whenever he did. God, he hated that.

But there was something that had been chained up inside him that broke free in that moment, and he didn’t want to hold it back anymore. He _couldn’t_. Will laughed in a bitter sort of way, forcing himself not to cry in front of his friend with every ounce of his strength. _Don’t be the weak one._

Will was taken aback by the sudden rush of courage he felt. “Well, Jesus Christ, you must not be trying all that hard, because you are. You _are_ being a jerk.”

“Will—”

“‘Not your fault’?” he echoed his friend’s words. Tears glistened in the blistering gaze he held as intensely as he could with Mike, poising as a threat. He swallowed them down.

“You know what? Fuck this. Fuck _you_, Wheeler.” Will spit out the last name with animosity, like it was the last thing he would ever want in his mouth. Like it was poison. In that moment, it might as well have been.

An jarring emotion Will recognized to be none other than hurt dimmed the usual lightness of Mike’s features. Will watched as his annoyance just melted into... sadness. He blanched, and opened his mouth to say something, but must’ve thought better of it. This was a strange, foreign feeling to Will; the act of inflicting the pain onto someone, instead of receiving it.

Surprisingly, Will didn’t like it at all. It was more power over someone than he wanted or deserved to have. That wasn’t who he was. Will had always been the one to take the blows. He made a mental note to never let himself reach that point of honest, ugly words again. Then, remembered that it was Mike who had driven him there.

Pain wasn’t a good look on Mike.

It was a look that made Will want to say that he was sorry, over and over, as if it wasn’t a useless sentiment. Ask him where it hurt, then kiss it better. But Will Byers was, and would always be, a coward. So he would only do such brave things once he got home, in his dreams.

“I’m going home,” he muttered in an apology’s stead. It wasn’t the first time he’d said that, that night.

With that, Will turned his back on the boy who always managed to find his way into his heart and somehow tear it apart every time. The worst part was that he was just too oblivious and fucking _dense_ to notice. Unsteadily, he took hold of the handlebars on his hand-me-down bike and wheeled it a few feet into the downpour, without looking back. Now that he was safe knowing Mike couldn’t see them, he let the repressed tears trickle down his face.

He cursed himself for having that much pride. Cursed himself for being what he was.

His anxiety was relentless in its gnawing away at his sanity. They were supposed to get through it all together— no matter what the world threw at them. No matter how strange, painful, or crazy. That had been their promise to each other, the one thing Will had felt safe enough to cling to and truly believe in. Now the truth dawned on him like a blow to the gut, like getting his heart physically ripped out of his chest.

All this time, he had been hoping for something to happen. Waiting, almost. Instead of trying, he had held himself back; _waiting_ on Mike, and living off of the pieces of platonic love he left him to work with now and then. He had been unknowingly living in a fantasy of his own creation, and this was his call back to the cruel reality. _I’m so fucking stupid to think I had a chance, _he scolded himself silently and wheeled his bike out further. _So, so stupid._

“Will— Will, _wait_! Please don’t leave.”

This startled him. He didn’t deserve that softness of Mike’s voice. Yet it was there, in a way that demanded reckoning. More than anything, it was breakable. It nearly caught him off guard. Will could feel the strain, the desperation, the regret, shifting uncomfortably through the space between them, even with his back turned. It definitely went both ways.

Yet everything reasonable in the rational side of Will’s mind was screaming at him to leave, to take off on his bike, to go home. To stop trying altogether. He was sick to death of this back-and-forth game that they played, of getting his hopes up, only to be reminded as a slap to the face every time that in the end he did not matter as much as she did. Even though the rain that already soaked through his clothes had the potential to give him pneumonia—his mom would freak out for sure—he wanted badly to want to give up and leave. But something within the dangerous, erratic pounding of his heart he couldn’t explain but knew existed said softly; _stay._

If Will Byers had learned anything throughout the mess that was his life, it was that listening to that hushed, smitten voice within his throbbing heart had always given him nothing but trouble. So he forced himself to refrain. What he felt was wrong. You live and learn, to take the safe route home. If you’re smart, anyways. Or just a coward. Will knew he was the latter. It was hell, to button his lip and keep his mouth shut. The invisible hand’s grip around his heart only tightened; he only lost himself a bit more every time. It was a bad idea, to bottle up his feelings, because eventually they would all spill out. Then he would be left to clean up the mess that he made, that he could have avoided if he were only strong enough, alone. The way he would always be.

“I’m an idiot.” The numbness of Mike’s voice dragged Will out of his inner soliloquy. He hated how easy it sounded for him to say that.

“I’m an idiot, I’m an asshole, I’m a shit friend. And you have… every right in the fucking world to hate me. I don’t blame you.” Mike’s voice broke with a suppressed sob, and Will felt an agonizing pang in his heart. He couldn’t stand to hear him talk about himself that way. Though he was still sick from the aching betrayal, echoing in his head, Will wanted to spin to face him, then hug him with all his might; tell him over and over that it would be okay. They were okay. _I don’t hate you. I forgive you. I love you. I’m sorry. _But he just stood there, motionless, mute, in the driveway.

Mike was rambling now, and showed no signs of stopping without an intervention. “I’m just, really sorry, Will. I—I guess I just got so caught up with-with El, with everythingI thought was important, I let it distract me from what really is important to me. _You_, Will. You are what’s important to me.”

Will could hear the careful footsteps Mike drew, nearer and nearer towards him. He was suddenly aware that he had been holding his breath in for way too long without meaning to. He let it go, his tearful gaze fixated onto the rain which hit the driveway pavement in a steady flow. _Stop crying. Jesus, stop crying._

Releasing a shaky breath, Will pushed the kickstand on his bike into the downward position. In a swift movement, he turned around, only to realize that Mike had moved to stand much closer than he had anticipated and prepared himself for. There was only less than a diminishing foot of space between them. And unless that was just drops of rain or the shitty lighting playing tricks on him, there were tears in his eyes too.

“You’re important to me, too, Mike. Even though you are an idiot.” The prettiest idiot he had ever seen.

Mike’s eyebrow quirked at that, and he stifled a tearful laugh that made Will’s heart swell. “That— Alright, I deserved that.”

Will warned himself halfheartedly to look away—from Mike’s soft brown eyes, dilated and hopeful. The color of his eyes, it had always reminded him of steaming black coffee, sort of like the kind his mom would gulp down with a sour face before leaving for her early shift, just to stay awake. The little galaxy of freckles dotted across his cheeks and nose flushed in a shade of pink, his furrowed brows pulled together in a concerned expression, his soft-looking lips, twitched into a shy smile, perhaps slightly bruised and chapped from a nervous habit of biting— but he couldn’t help it. God had taken His sweet time with him, Will was sure. He was, unfairly and inhumanly, beautiful.

One thing he knew to be true: nothing he could say could even come close to expressing how much he loved him.

“Hey,” said Mike.

It was only one word. One word that he had heard him say a million times, but it came out so softly, Will could’ve perished on the spot. The pads of his thumb brushed against Will’s cheek and wiped away the tears from his pale skin in a gentle motion. “_Hey_. Look at me.”

He moved a half-step in closer to the boy with a mess of raven curls, exhaling as he fiddled with loose stitching on his shirt between his fingers. He did his best to hold eye contact, as he had asked him to, and regardless of how scary— it felt right.

Words he had said, he wished he could take back, played like a broken record in his mind. He thought he might be sick. _You know what? Fuck this. __Fuck _you_, Wheeler._

“Mike, about all that stuff I said before, I... I didn’t mean... I’m sorry.”

He shook his head, brushing off the attempt at an apology. Foolish of him to assume that Will was so blind that he couldn’t see how the light in his eyes was gone. Gone because Will had put it out. “I deserved it,” he said again. It sounded like he was talking more to himself than to Will.

“You didn’t.”

“Yeah, I did, Will.”

Will mirrored Mike’s movement in a slight shake of his head. The other boy’s hand still rested and tenderly grazed across the skin of his fair, tear-stained cheek. It sparked a certain electricity that coursed through his body. Will searched to locate the endless depths of his best friend’s moist eyes he wanted to believe were still there, for something, _anything._ To try and read between the lines, get a glimpse at what he was feeling. Maybe Mike was just as scared and confused as him. Maybe he wasn’t completely alone after all.

Then, Mike’s hand drifted down from his cheek, too soon, and Will noticed the lack of contact immediately. Now that he had experienced it firsthand, he _wanted_ that feeling, to chase after it, and for it to stay. Badly. Probably way too much.

Mike coughed awkwardly, suggesting that they go back inside to find Lucas. But Will just shook his head in dismissal, swaying from side to side the way he only did when nerves were getting the better of him. Mike was still so close, too close, and Will was close to breaking.

“Mike, I just…” his words drifted off someplace he couldn’t retrieve them. Truthfully, he wasn’t entirely sure where they were meant to go in the first place. His worried eyes darted almost frantically to the floor, then back to his friend. This would be so much _easier_ if his growing desire to get closer to him wasn’t a distraction to his rational thoughts, as usual. It was moments like this that made Will wish he could trade his True Sight for the superpower to turn invisible. That way, he could escape, go unnoticed, to fade quietly out of existence, just as he had always wanted.

“Um, actually I— I actually wanted to talk to you about something.”

The words had already spilled from his mouth before he had the chance to think it through to adequately silence himself. He swore under his breath, but not towards Mike.

Mike was nodding to urge him onward, rubbing the back of his neck. _Nervous tic_, Will recognized. “Say it.”

Under his breath, Will muttered something along the lines of _oh God, I can’t believe I’m doing this._ He sniffled sadly, and brushed away old tears that left stains on his reddened cheeks with the back of his palm. He chuckled in a bittersweet sort of way (Mike decided quickly that was a bad sign).

“God. you’re gonna… hate me.”

Mike frowned and the crease between his brows deepened. “What? No, Will, don’t say that. I could never, ever, hate you. You’re my best friend.”

Will’s heart dropped at that word. There it was. _Friend_. Best _friend_. Will was Mike’s _friend_. Obviously. That was what he had been since kindergarten, and that was all would ever be. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise. But that didn’t stop the sudden and stinging wave of sadness that overtook him. Part of him was ready to accept defeat and cut his losses. But the other _knew_— knew that he was in far too deep to back out now.

“I just, um…” Will began his exposure, his unraveling, like anxious tugging on loose threads of an old t-shirt until nothing was left but raw edges. He drew in a quick breath of air that smelled of rain. Terror coursed through him. _Bad idea, Byers. Bad fucking idea._

_God, _Will thought, as if someone up there could read his mind and have mercy,_ if there was ever a time you should kill me, now’s the time._

“I’m in love with you.”

-

_I’m in love with you._

It was those five words that made Mike Wheeler just about choke on his own breath and keel over backwards.

Suddenly, he needed time, but there wasn’t enough in the world to process the feelings that had just been unburdened by his first friend’s heavy statement. Feelings that were causing the ache in his chest to swell, become impossible to ignore. Every thought in his mind before this second emptied and he was left to weigh what few options he had at his disposal; what the _hell_ he was supposed to do. Words he wanted to say out loud danced on his tongue, almost tauntingly, but they died there. _I love you, I love you, I love you so much I’m fucking afraid of it. _How can you not see that?__

All he said was, “W-What?”

Fear of he knew not what glinted in Will’s hazel eyes. From this close up, Mike could see the small flecks of forest green within his irises, and the glimmering tears that were leaving trails on his fair cheeks. He could only think, _wow_.

Then the pain of guilt welled up in his chest again. Mike had done this. Mike had been the cause of Will’s tears. Sweet Will, understanding Will, his first ever and best friend, the love of his life. The one who could make him fall or fly. Mike had been the one to hurt him, with his sharp tongue and his big fucking mouth, and he had never felt more sorry in his life than in that moment. Regrets blurred together in a fuzzy image of what could’ve been, what _should_ have been, if only he could fix it. If only he could go back.

He made a decision, then. That he would never forgive himself.

Will was saying something Mike could barely hear over his throbbing pulse. Reading lips was never something he could do, but he knew all too well what ‘I’m sorry’ looked like on Will’s lips. He had always said it too much. As though he had a reason to be.

There was no air left to breathe in his lungs, because Mike Wheeler couldn’t remember a time when he wasn’t hollow, a shell of a human, who had been underestimated and put down to the point of his beginning to see less and less if ever he looked in the mirror. He had always felt the need to repeat himself more than once, as no one seemed to care enough to listen. He knew that there was only one person who cared, who was more than enough, to could bring him closer to the feeling of wholeness. Mike Wheeler told himself to breathe, to get it together, even though he could not.

Mike blinked back tears, his initial shock on display as clear as daylight in his widened, vulnerable eyes and twitching mouth. A loss for words invaded him swiftly. All at once, the walls were closing in, he wondered why he felt so _small_, like his heart was bursting at its seams. It hurt, in the best way. God, it really hurt. He felt selfish for feeling it. _Will loves me. Will loves me. Oh my God, I’m not the only one._

“I just.. needed you to know,” said Will after his voice came back into focus, quietly, as though he had expected there to be no answer, “once.”

With nothing else to do, both of them tuned into the silence of the garage again. The steady rain, the occasional crack of thunder, their hearts set on rapid fire. It was like listening to your favorite song on the radio, when it would suddenly fade out and drown in a seemingly infinite sea of static, just before the chorus. But it wasn’t dead. There was something there that neither of them could really put into words and make sense of. Maybe it was alive.

Because it had been more than too long, Mike finally gave a weak shake of his head, not quite smiling. An intense gaze of incredulity down at the floor for a fleeting moment. It came as a surprise that Will hadn’t turned tail and left a long time ago. This wasn’t real, he told himself once again.

“Yeah, well, you know what, Byers?” he managed to get out through his sobs. “I still don’t hate you.” He found himself hoping selfishly that Will felt the same spark that Mike did as he took his first friend’s smaller hand in his. Gently squeezed it, brushed over his knuckles with the pads of his thumb, as if he were such a breakable thing.

“I don’t hate you,” he repeated, more softly, except Will heard him, he always _heard_ him, and the way Mike said it could’ve held a candle to the way someone who had caught the fever of feelings might mumble softly to their lover, ‘_I love you_.’ Maybe he didn’t want to, but he did. What he truly wanted was to _say it_, so that Will would know he felt the same, that he always had, but the words were still caught in his throat.

He wondered how it was possible to love someone that much when all you’ve ever done is hate yourself.

Mike’s gaze pointedly flickered downwards to meet Will’s. He was suddenly pleasantly aware of their massive height difference, and he had to restrain a smile at the thought. Into his eyes came a sort of softness, and he breathed outwards carefully. Tears had begun to blur his vision, leaking involuntarily from his eyes. So he reached out his arms to pull Will into him, though he knew he didn’t have the right. In this moment, he didn’t care about anything else but Will. He never had, not really. He held onto him for dear life, numb, and listening to the soothing sound of his best friend’s ragged intakes of breath, so grateful that he was, as his tears hit his shoulder. _Plink, plink, plink._

“If I’d known,” he mumbled into Will’s shirt, fingertips shaking in their grip on the fabric. “If I hadn’t been such a coward— I should’ve... w-we could’ve...”

Should’ve, could’ve, would’ve. Three of the most dangerous words to date.

Will didn’t say anything back. Just held onto him as if their bodies were two correlative puzzle pieces, fingertips stroking his hair in the gentlest way. He let him bury his face in his shoulder and cry his heart out. Mike loved him for that. Mike loved Will for a lot more reasons, though.

Awkward, tentative, Mike’s unsteady fingers gingerly cupped Will’s flushed cheeks that were splattered artfully with moles and freckles here and there. In that moment, no different from the way he had forever, Mike thought that Will was perhaps the most lovely being he’d ever laid eyes on. No one held a candle to him. From his wary eyes that reminded him of a forest, to his tentative, gentle, intuitive nature. Mike believed that he had this gift; to be so soft, and yet, so strong. His sheer power never failed to astound him, leave him wordless.

Mike didn’t deserve him. But somehow, by forces of chance and luck, he had him.

Hesitant as he began to tilt his head to one side, Mike reminded himself to calm his shaky breaths that lightly fanned across Will’s parting lips. He shook his head disbelievingly, a ghost of a smile timidly appearing on his lips. In despite of the euphoria, with it, doubt crept in through the cracks of his mind. What happens if he wakes up? What if it’s not real?

At last, Mike leaned down close to Will and closed the few inches of distance that had held them apart for so long, finally let it fade to nothing. Their lips made bare, chaste contact; light, soft, and shy as they found each other. The faint taste of cherry cola and the smell of rain, smothered Mike’s senses as Will’s hand shifted upwards to begin messing up and tangling in his unruly chestnut curls. He swore that his heart was about to beat out of his chest.

It was Will who made the move to deepen the kiss, nudging in closer still so his chest was nearly flush against his own. He swore that he could feel Will’s fluttering heart, the ticking pulse in his knuckles and neck; just as wild and out of control as his own was. The shock, the amazement, the otherworldly feeling. Mike didn’t want to think about how he might never feel this with Will again. They both pulled back a few inches, gasping for air.

Their foreheads pressed together still, the only noise being the soft downpour of rain outside and their shaky, uneven breathing. _It was real, it was all real. _They didn’t have to pretend and play games anymore. No one else needed to be in on their secrets. This was them, they were okay, they would be okay.

And neither one of them was ready to let go.

**Author's Note:**

> h e y please leave something if u enjoyed it ! <3


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